Draco's Nightmare
by wildwindflower
Summary: Draco had a nightmare about his past and awakes to find new hope in his family. Hopefully more engaging than that summary- Please leave suggestions and criticism.


**Hi, I wrote this and thought I'd put it up. There's definitely a lot of room for improvement. Constructive criticism is welcomed, particularly on how I could have improved the conclusion which I really don't like very much. **

**– Thanks Wildwindflower**

_All he can hear is screaming, screaming from all those desperate people locked in the dungeon, screaming from all those hopeless people Lord Voldemort will inevitable kill. He spins around staring at all those chained innocent souls and he feels just as helpless as they are. Terrified he runs up the steps out through the maze of dark walls out onto the first floor. _

_He pounds on his front door trying to escape out into the garden but it's locked. It feels like the screams are getting closer he turns terrified and runs down the hall behind him, most of the doors are closed, the few he look into haunt him only more. _

_The first door he reaches that is open is the main dining room, he knows what will be in there but he looks anyhow. The long black table, once shiny mahogany now covered with slashes, burn marks and blood stains, is lined with death eaters in dark cloaks fear in their eyes. A nameless muggleborn is crumpled in a heap in the center. The Dark Lord himself sits at the head. Draco knows this scene too well yet he cannot turn away as he is told that he must kill Dumbledore by himself. The impossible task – Dumbledore is too powerful to die, Draco is too young, too compassionate to kill. _

_With all his willpower he wrenches his gaze from the scene running again down the hall, his childhood playground turned into his worst nightmare. He stops again as if not of his own will at a second door. Even with all the screaming chasing behind him he can hear his own scream of pain as the Dark Lord brands him with The Mark that will never come off his skin. His moment of agony is one of the few times he's seen the Dark Lord smile. _

_The last room on that floor is a different dining room. The Dark Lord himself is not present, instead he sees his childhood enemy, Hermione Granger. He remembers all the times when he was too young to care about anything but his pride, when he wished nothing more than for her to hurt for being so smart, for making him wonder if even a Mudblood could do better than him. Now as he watches his deranged aunt carve that word into her skin he wishes nothing more than to save her. He's drawn away from the door before she is rescued._

_He runs up the stairs, the screaming's getting closer, the first room he reaches is his childhood playroom but the toys that used to glow and sparkle with magic now lie split and broken on the floor, objects of his father's rage. He feels his father push him aside, "You have to join them, they stand for us" he says angrily as Draco wavers . With a look of disgust at his sympathy for the "enemy" his father turns and says, "Well, it's this or our lives, boy" He doesn't have to turn around to know that Draco is following him. He still coward enough to care about that._

_He continues to run down the hall panting. The next time he is ground to a stop is his father's study. He watches silently as his father sobs, the father that told him "Malfoys never cry". It's all too real now, he's on his own in this dark and treacherous path. He's never going to say "My father will hear about this" again because he's realized that his father is just as scared as he is._

_The air is so thick with screams and fear that he can't take it and continues running up to the roof but as he reaches the latch the scene shifts and by the time he's emerged he sees Dumbledore standing at the top of the astronomy tower, entirely within his power, but he realizes he has no power and he can't do the one thing that will save his family. As his need for survival and his reluctance to kill whip around in him faster and faster until he feels like he'll explode before his godfather, the one who'd always seemed to be on his side steps forward and kills him. He watches the greatest wizard who ever lived fall and he knows there is no hope, he knows that he is stuck in the clutches of Lord Voldemort forever._

_He turns running down the stairs of the castle. Everywhere Deatheaters are slaughtering innocent students. He halts on the 7__th__ floor in front of a room he knows all too well. Within he sees the flames. Clinging to the top of a pile of debris is Crabbe, a bit slow but someone's who's been by his side since day one. He reaches out his hand and the door swings shut swallowing the boy forever in the flames. _

_He continues to run on through the battle. He stops at Myrtles bathroom. He's writhing on the floor. Harry Potter is panicking above his bleeding body. All he can think through the pain is "I deserve it, I deserve it." _

_He continues on through the battle dodging curses and watching those who don't die around him. Finally he reaches the Great Hall. All around him are bodies, bodies of people killed by people like him. He's surrounded by blank but familiar faces. The dead and the living, they all blame him, and he sometimes wishes he was one of the dead not left still alive._

Gasping he wakes up to Astoria calling his name, his own voice hoarse from screaming. Lying there he sobs. She says the same things she says every night, "You were just a kid" "you have changed". He knows it's true yet part of him will still always be broken; they both know that. The mark on his arm will never come off, neither will the mark on his heart. Yet now he does have something to live for.

As his breathing calms Astoria gets up from the bed guiding him by the hand and he follows. They walk down the hall, so much warmer now than in that hallway in the past to that same little playroom he knows so well. The toys littered across the floor are unbroken, so is the boy in the bed beside them.

Scorpius will remember the Great Hall as the place he met Albus and Rose, his best friends.

He will remember the Room of Requirement as the place his merry band would sneak and chat, read, or play games by the cozy fireside.

He will remember the Astronomy tower as the place he and Rose shared their perfect first kiss.

He will remember the study as the place his father has assured him that he had really redeemed the Mafoy name.

Scorpius will remember the playroom as the place of his children's innocent childhood as well as his own.

He will remember the family dining room as the place he told his parents that he was engaged.

He will remember that huge front door as the threshold over which he carried Rose Malfoy on their wedding night.

Scorpius will remember an entirely different world, peaceful, light, unbroken. Of course he will have his struggles but he will never know pain like Draco knows it and as Draco looks down on the sleeping child before meeting his wife's kind eyes, he knows that that is why, although he has many regrets, he never regrets his own survival.


End file.
